


Before I Go

by kunstvogel



Series: BoB Canon Era Vignettes [8]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Canon Era, Friendship, Gen, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-23 01:13:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13776555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kunstvogel/pseuds/kunstvogel
Summary: Lew's lost just about everything- but perhaps he still has a place in Dick's life.





	Before I Go

**Author's Note:**

> For an anon on Tumblr.

After the war, four things happen to Lew. He loses Dick, his father dies, he files for a second divorce, and the nitration plant is liquidated. By then Dick has already made his home in Pennsylvania and settled down with a lovely woman named Ethel, and they are expecting a son. Lew doesn’t know his own kid - he saw her, once, right after his father died and he and Kathy were summoned to court to settle on the inheritance. She was but five years old, sketching in a little book and mindless to the events of the room. She didn’t even know Lew was her father.

Lewis divorced Irene not long after that, and then the plant went out of business. Lewis was never meant to be a businessman, he thinks, and he’d failed to keep their systems up to date now that plastics were made differently and more efficiently. Dick had had foresight- he told Lew over and over that they should start upgrading their systems, but Lew didn’t listen, and the former major packed up and left.

They didn’t speak for nearly two years, and it isn’t until Lew has lost everything that he picks up the phone and asks the operator for Richard Winters’ home line.

“Hello?” Dick’s voice crackles over the line, and Lew’s heart skips a beat.

“It’s Lewis,” he chokes out. There’s a long silence, and Lew’s half afraid Dick’s hung up on him. “Dick?”

“Yeah- I-I’m here,” Dick says. “Hold on.” There’s another silence, and Lew hears a door shut. “Hey,” Dick says finally. “It’s been a while.”

“Yeah.” Lew sniffs, picking at his pant leg. He’s craving a drink, but something stops him from getting one. “Dad’s dead,” he says.

“I’m sorry.” Dick sounds so sincere, too, not like anyone else who’d offered Lew their condolences.

“Thanks.” Lew sighs. “I, uh- I was thinking of moving to California. The plant’s gone, and the city’s- well, it’s not called Nixon anymore.” Lew chuckles dryly. “There’s nothing here for me anymore.”

Dick makes a soft noise of sympathy over the line.

“I- I wanted to see you,” Lew admits. “Before I go.” He knows, deep within his heart, that he won’t see Dick again after he moves. He hasn’t seen any of the men, in fact, since the war- Dick keeps in contact with them all, goes to reunions, but Lew has never had the heart to. He wasn’t anything special to them. He put them in danger on a regular basis- it was his job to map out their battles. He’s sure they don’t think kindly of him.

“Lew,” Dick says, and pauses. Lew’s chest is tight. It’s over now, he’s sure.

“Lew, I could never say no to you.”


End file.
